Coming off the heels of its predecessor in The Fellowship of the Ring, now 20 years ago from today (date of posting), The Two Towers rolled in and scored almost a billion dollars at the worldwide box office and was nominated for six Academy Awards of which it won two. Although the film suffers slightly from Peter Jackson’s screenplay taking several liberties with the source material, there can be no mistaking that the film is an undeniable accomplishment in the history of cinema. Whether or not one is a lover of the source material or whether or not one is merely an average moviegoer or a hardcore cinephile, it delivers an incredible world of wonders.

The Two Towers begins with a callback to Gandalf’s (McKellen) tiff with a Balrog from The Fellowship of the Ring. However, after he whispers “Fly you fools” and falls into the depths of the Mines of Moria, the film expands on that battle as it saw Gandalf and Balrog match. Meanwhile, the hobbits were last seen with Boromir (Sean Bean) who tried to take the one ring from Frodo, so Frodo (Wood) and Sam (Sean Astin) had taken off on their own to try and carry the ring into Mordor, to cast it into the fires of Mount Doom. But as they traverse some treacherous terrain, the duo encounter the creature Gollum (Andy Serkis) who soon became their enslaved guide across the terrain. Also, the trio consisting of Aragorn (Viggo Mortensen), Legolas (Orlando Bloom), and Gimli (John Ryes-Davies) are in hot pursuit of an elite orc squadron. While the film covers more ground than could possibly be covered here, suffice it to say that there is plenty of chess piece maneuvering taking place by the forces of good and evil. All of this culminates in a spectacular battle that rages for almost forty-five minutes that eventually lays the groundwork for the final installment of the trilogy, The Return of the King. Simply, the film is as epic as they come.

In virtually every way, The Two Towers is a technical marvel. The groundbreaking motion capturing technology used to create Gollum, was on the cutting edge at the time and deservedly won an Academy Award for Best Visual Effects. The score by Howard Shore, that follows in the footsteps of his Oscar-winning score for The Fellowship of the Ring, is incredible and truly a masterpiece of composing. The cast is also great across the board and is truly an all-timer. The pacing and story flows perfectly well in spite of its near 3-hour running time as it builds towards the film’s the third act featuring the aforementioned spectacular final battle. The only real gripe is, as mentioned, Jackson’s liberties with the original source material. The added drama was confusing and unnecessary while only distracting from the story progression. At the end of the day, that gripe is a minor one as there’s so much else to love here in what is otherwise the middle part of one of the greatest trilogy of films ever created.

In the end, The Two Towers is the weak link of Jackson’s trilogy simply because of it’s deviation from the source material and the added melodrama it seemingly felt that it needed just to punch up its story. That being said, the battle of Helm’s Deep battle is a miraculous piece of cinema and anything less than a perfect score is simply not something this reviewer is willing to concede.

(original review)

*still courtesy of New Line Cinema*

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Russell Miller

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